There exist a myriad of advantages to being able to transfer computer-readable data between and among two or more computing devices. Typically, such transfers are most conveniently carried out through the exchange of communications across a network of computing devices. As such, the quantity of data being transferred across networks of computing devices continues to increase. To support the transfer of such increasing amounts of data, providers of computer network services invest a substantial amount of resources into computer networking hardware. Maximizing the utilization of such computer networking hardware can, therefore, be desirable from an efficiency standpoint.
Unfortunately, consumers that generate network data traffic are often unaware of one another, and simply utilize a network to transfer their data whenever they desire to do so. Often such consumers seek to transfer large volumes of data across a network of computing devices during the same time periods, thereby excessively taxing the network. Such overlapping transfers can occur even if one or more consumers may have the option of delaying their transfers to another time, since mechanisms are not provided by which such data transfers can be time shifted to a more convenient time. Consequently, not only can such inflexibility result in periods of excessive network taxation, they can also result in other time periods during which such consumers are mostly idle, which can result in an underutilization of the network. Consequently, the providers of computer network services are often forced to purchase costly computer networking hardware to accommodate those instances when multiple consumers of network services all seek to transfer large volumes of data during the same time periods, knowing that such costly computer networking hardware will likely remain underutilized for substantial portions of its service life.